The judge stopped Minoret and said: “Do you know that Mademoiselle Mirouet has refused your son’s hand?”
“But,” interposed the abbe, “do not be uneasy; she will prevent the duel.”
“Ah, then my wife succeeded?” said Minoret. “I am very glad, for it nearly killed me.”
“You are, indeed, so changed that you are no longer like yourself,” remarked Bongrand.
Minoret looked alternately at the two men to see if the priest had betrayed the dreams; but the abbe’s face was unmoved, expressing only a calm sadness which reassured the guilty man.
“And it is the more surprising,” went on Monsieur Bongrand, “because you ought to be filled with satisfaction. You are lord of Rouvre and all those farms and mills and meadows and—with your investments in the Funds, you have an income of one hundred thousand francs—”
“I haven’t anything in the Funds,” cried Minoret, hastily.
“Pooh,” said Bongrand; “this is just as it was about your son’s love for Ursula,—first he denied it, and now he asks her in marriage. After trying to kill Ursula with sorrow you now want her for a daughter-in-law. My good friend, you have got some secret in your pouch.”
Minoret tried to answer; he searched for words and could find nothing better than:—
“You’re very queer, monsieur. Good-day, gentlemen”; and he turned with a slow step into the Rue des Bourgeois.